Actual Workplace Organizational Issues Paper Example

Introduction

Organizational problems affect every firm. At least, no organization is clear of issues affecting its profitability or affecting the performance of workers. The case of Engstrom Auto Mirror Plant gives some administrative problems that adversely affected its performance. This included poor communication, mistrust among employees, unfair treatment and reduced management commitment (Beer & Elizabeth, 2008). A combination of these issues resulted in the downfall of the company. The firm I work for, which I choose to call Company X for confidentiality purposes, is not an exception either.

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Since I reported to Company X, there has been minimal efforts by the management to ensure that I get oriented for the job I do. Interacting with fellow employees has allowed me to know that this has been the trend in the company. While they assure their employees of adequate training, they fail in the first instance by failing to provide a proper orientation for their new employees. The orientation only stops at introducing the new employee to other workers. Orientation forms the compass for an employee. Failure in giving a proper orientation may result in costly mistakes by the new employee. Orientation is a form of training that makes the employee well conversant with every aspect of the work environment (Donavan et al. 2004, 128).

During my stay in the company, there have been several instances of delay in the procurement processes. This has led to late service delivery. The company has long procurement processes which cannot be superseded even when the clients need urgent deliveries. Along procurement, chain represents a lengthy communication channel in which information has to pass through various channels before it is finally passed to the top management. There are times when information gets distorted while still on the channel as it gets adjusted to the company's specifications. Without proper communication, duties are not effectively carried out. Having many people receiving a message before it gets to the final receiver increase the chances of tampering with the information, and the time it takes to obtain feedback (Brown & Starkey, 2009, 810).

In some cases, Company X lacks unity of purpose of coordination among employees. When tackling a given duty, I receive differing instructions from different people or departments. This demoralizes me and reduces my performance because I have to reconcile the instructions. This illustrates the lack of coordination among the employees in the organization. Lack of coordination slows down performance and denies employees a chance to maximumly exhibit their skills (Beer & Elizabeth, 2008, 2).

Root causes from a human behavioral perspective

The administrative challenges affecting Company X have a solution. The solution of these issues depends on establishing the root cause of the problem. The cause can either be due to organizational or human behavior or a combination of both. This section takes a look at the look at the root causes of a human behavioral perspective. Interacting with employees in Company X has made me understand that there is a notion of "how things are done here." Almost every employee has a negative attitude towards excellence. They are tired of the long procurement processes and the poor orientation and minimal training chances. Other than being the cause of the division among the workforce, no employee is willing to reconcile. Everyone is working for his ambitions. The culture of the institution has adversely affected the attitude of the employees (Lok & Crawford, 2004, 331).

Most employees in Company X, are unwilling to speak one voice. This is a negative attitude towards change. One clear behavioral aspect in Company X is the alienation of the organization's goals from the personal goals. The main goal employees have is to earn money. They posit that the lengthy communication and procurement channels reduce the rate of productivity to their advantage. Organizational behavior has played a major role in shaping human behavior. Ensuring better training, shortening the communication and procurement channels, and fostering teamwork make the work environment-friendly. A friendly work environment is another form of motivation that pushes workers to work better (Lok & Crawford, 2004, 336).

Impacts of poorly aligned and administered human behavior theories

Human behavior ideas and models have different aspects of administration and alignment. The first area is in decision making. Though managers mainly do decision making, the impact of poor decision making affects the employees and hence their performance in the organization (MacDonald, 2018). For instance, Company X's management opts for a longer procurement process to ensure to reduce the probability of fraud without the taking into consideration that this will slow down the firm's performance.

Training is another area. Without training, it becomes tough for employees with best qualifications to adapt to a work environment. Training should begin from the orientation level and continue as long as an employee stays in the organization. Poor administration of training hampers employee from learning new methods of production that can match the dynamic market condition. This has a direct negative impact on the competitiveness of the business (MacDonald, 2018).

Another aspect that closely relates to human behavior in organizations is the culture upheld in an enterprise. For instance, a culture of teamwork facilitates cooperation and collective efforts towards attaining the organization's goals. Without teamwork, employees are likely to pursue their own goals. Another important area defined by the organization is communication. A poorly defined communication network discourages employees from communicating any helpful idea to the management (MacDonald, 2018).

References

Beer, M. & Elizabeth, C. (2008). Engstrom Auto Mirror Plant: Motivating in Good Times and Bad. Harvard Business School Brief Case 082-175.

Brown, A. D., & Starkey, K. (2012). The effect of organizational culture on communication and information. Journal of Management Studies, 31(6), 807-828.

Donavan, D. T., Brown, T. J., & Mowen, J. C. (2004). Internal benefits of service-worker customer orientation: Job satisfaction, commitment, and organizational citizenship behaviors. Journal of marketing, 68(1), 128-146.

Lok, P., & Crawford, J. (2004). The effect of organizational culture and leadership style on job satisfaction and organizational commitment: A cross-national comparison. Journal of management development, 23(4), 321-338.

MacDonald, L. (2018). Impacts of organizational behavior in business. Chron. Retrieved from: https://smallbusiness.chron.com/impacts-organizational-behavior-business-48407.html

Newstrom, J.W. (2015). Human behavior at work: Organizational Behavior. McGraw-Hill.